Throughout our responses to Promising Futures, we all talked about the different aspects of the plan that we really liked, as well as focusing on some of the challenges. In several of the responses, students mentioned how happy they were that tracking becomes eliminated in this plan. Rather than separating students in Maine high schools into the haves and have-nots (in terms of going to college) we would be able to teach these students tracked into different programs together while meeting all of their needs. This is something that several students related back to the idea of Mass Customized Learning, where each student gets to work at their own pace with a plethora of student choice. The combination of students working at their own pace and students having a ton of choice in their education would then help motivate students to continue learning and be successful.
Another idea that was mentioned by several students was the idea of phasing out the standard school year schedule, with school lasting six hours per day, five days per week, from September to June. If we are meeting students where they are at (as is suggested by Promising Futures) and letting them work at their own pace, how is it possible to keep the same regimented school structure for everyone? For some students, it might be better to allow them to come to school fewer hours per day but for more weeks, or to have students stay longer each day and come fewer days per week. Although there may not be a way to make this work effectively, the idea of letting students customize their school experience down to the hours, weeks, and months is incredibly interesting. Although we agreed on a lot, there were differing opinions about how much standardization should be put in place for the ideas presented in Promising Futures, revealing that while we all seemed to appreciate their ideas, that we would need to be a part of the implementation process to fully understand what these ideas look like in schools.
Rachel Joiner
I found this article to be interesting, as well as inspiring. Many of the things discussed in this article, are examples of things I wish to implement in my classroom, or various things we have discussed in class. I loved the idea of having teams as well as advisory “family groups” where teachers and students stayed together for four years, and had a great relationship. I think that this seems the best way to spread work out for teachers, as well as provide students with advisers and mentors who care and can help them throughout their high school career. I also thought the cross-disciplinary work with an essential theme was an excellent concept. I think that by doing this students can make real world connections, and gain a better understanding of a topic. This concept was something I would like to see implemented in my future school and class. I connected the idea that ran throughout this article of giving students a voice in their curriculum and letting them decide to our group’s educational issue of mass customized learning. I thought this was similar in the sense that students had choices and worked at their own pace. I think this is vital to allowing students to succeed and truly understand the content. I loved the idea of each student creating his or her own individualized learning plan, along with one for the future. I thought that sharing with their parents was a great idea too. I think this should be done in every school, because it offers personal help and goals to every single student, and helps them focus on their future with the guide and support of their teachers and parents. I think by implementing this more students will go on to graduate, seek higher education, and simply enjoy school overall more.
Daniel Kiley
Whenever I see standards of any kind involving education, I always see them as common sense. It is easier said than done, which is why we have these standards, so I understand.I have never been a part of a school devoted to Promising Futures, but some of the ideas sound really interesting. Having teams to help students forward can be beneficial to a school. Having extra support not only by teachers but also students creates a strong community, which I feel some schools lack. It's also nice to have professional conferences so teachers can be assessed on their standings. Cross-disciplinary work is also something I would be interested in partaking in. Usually you would see Social Studies with English, but I think it would be interesting to see other disciplines merge together, such as Math and English or Science and English. This reminds me of MCL, and Promised Futures is like the precursor to it. Having students individualize their own learning to make it authentic and something they are interested in is more important than any standard test. We want studies to learn, and in order to learn they must enjoy what they are doing. And when we bring parents into the equation, the community grows even larger, and the success the student is inevitable.
Lauren Breton
I really liked that Promising Futures emphasized that there are really two paths in every Maine high school: one for students who intend to go to college and one for everyone else. Although I had never thought of it that way, every traditional high school in Maine that I have heard about seems to separate students in this way. I also liked that in this text they did not put the blame on teachers for the failing school systems, but rather put the blame on how much we as a culture have asked our high schools to do with limited resources. I was also really happy to find out that Maine was ranked number one in the nation for allocating the money for education and actually placing that money into classrooms for teachers to use.
For me, the most interesting part of Promising Futures was the “Practices to Consider Phasing Out” section. Most of the practices that they discussed phasing out are practices that I experienced as a student and that I just accepted as a normal part of school. I particularly like the idea of phasing out the six hour, five day, September to June school schedule. While I think that taking a break from teaching and learning can be valuable for both students and teachers, I think that it would also be possible to involve students in learning for extended periods of times throughout the school year. I also liked the idea of getting staff involved in planning staff development days, as well as changing the culture so that we don’t consider those “days off”, but we consider them as a legitimate part of our jobs as teachers and integral to forming classroom environments that are safe and caring, focus on high learning goals for each student, and equitable practices throughout the entire school and curriculum.
Meng Hardy
There were so much inspirational ideas and approaches in Promising Future. Some of them are already in practice, such as a school being divided into communities and teachers having a set group of students. Those approaches may be more typical for middle schools, but I feel the importance for this system setup for younger high school students, when they are still in transition to be more independent on their academic and social lives. Before students know if they are on the college-track or career-track, they need a sense of belonging in the high school and community while approaching their self-realization.
Phasing out the “five days, six hours, and September to June” makes a lot of sense to me. It aligns with my belief of diverse learning styles, MIs, etc. We could benefit constructive professional development scheduled in the school year while students are engaged in meaningful activities that are lead by staff members.
There was another focus on individualized plan on learning. It fit with the belief and ideas of Mass Customized Learning. First two years of high school is a period of time when students need guidance but also thrive to make their own choices. Individualized plan gives students “voice and choice” in terms of their learning, which will make them more engaged in school, because they are learning what they are interested in. Individualized plan aligns with what most high schools do, however, in this article, I sense that it emphasize on the team teachers’ guidance and support that they could give to students. For the first two years of high school, students can truly benefit from those support until they are more independent on decision making.
Megan Millette
This article seemed very interesting and had many strong key points being made. From the statistics at the beginning to the challenge and its focus, this article has helped me discover a diverse range of information on Maine schools. The challenge presented in Promising Futures is an area of education I wish could have been implemented into my school in the past. This system acts as a great equalizer in making sure students, parents, faculty, educators, and administrators get an opinion and job in the learning experience. The core principles and practices help create this idea of a learning community that caters to all. I really enjoyed this aspect of it because it mainly shows that all these people play a role in education that is equally important, even if some of these members are aware of their roles. This shows how schools can come together to promise students the best education they deserve while also staying true to their interests and goals.
Many of the aspects discussed in this article were areas in which I wished to look at further. There were many that I had already desired for my classroom and learning atmosphere. This article emphasized the fact that most of the areas I wished to pursue in my classroom were possible. I really enjoyed the main principles that dealt with making the classroom a safe environment for all and dealt mainly with understanding students as a whole but also individually. I also really enjoyed the focus on students and the multiple ways to educate students that will help them better understand. This article encourages us to focus on students needs but to also work collaboratively with many different people within the school environment. I really liked how the 15 practices help to show this collaboration and allow all to see their importance in the learning experience. This article was really educational and I found myself desiring to see it being used in a classroom.
Kevin Lind
After reading Promising Futures, I thoroughly think that some standardization is necessary in schools. As much as I hate to say it, there doesn’t seem to be any better way of making sure teachers are meeting the needs of their students. I wish there could be a more effective means of making sure teachers are following the principles described in this piece. It could be cool if schools adopted a similar model to summer camps; having visits from administrative officials to make sure certain practices are being implemented.
Principle 10 stands out to me as the principle that is the most powerful. It essentially suggests that students should be able to base their learning around a schedule that is most effective for them. I especially like the idea of bringing together a team of teachers to evaluate what would work best of their students. This idea reminds me of when I had an IEP that allowed me to go to school for half days due to increased fatigue. How great would it be if we could take the time to make an IEP for every student?!
I’m also really into the idea of integrating learning into discussions about life outside of school. As a future social studies teacher, I spend a lot of time looking at events happening around the world. For me, having students looking at implementing what I teach them to better the world is my idea of success. I know when I was in high school, my government teacher continually pushed us to write to our elected officials about issues that affected us.
Kaitlyn Bukauskas
'Promising Futures' is a report calling a need for change in Maine's secondary and technical schools. The report aims to motivate school faculty, parents, community members, and students in playing active roles to improve the learning experience of students so that every Maine youth receives a secondary education that provides the necessary skills, knowledge, and attitudes to secure for them a promising and productive future. The report breaks goals down into 6 'Core Principles' to help achieve this goal:
A safe, respectful and caring environment
High universal expectations with a variety of learning opportunities
Understanding and actions based on assessmenst data
Teacher practice which values and builds upon the contributions and needs of each learner
Equitable and democratic practices
Coherence among mission, goals, actions, and outcomes.
'Promising Futures' states that student achievement in the state of Maine varies greatly from school to school dependent upon community resources, and even within the schools with students attending what feels like two high schools within one- one with students in a college track, and one with students in another track. The report states that tracking is an ineffective way to group students and says that often times the "lower" tracks have too many students, many of which are not being challenged and are capable of more than they are doing but don't bother to try because they are not offered the challenge or motivated by teachers, parents, or the community. We need to eliminate this idea of forcing students into tracked education plans and instead put the responsiblity onto the student and empower him or her to create an educational plan with goals aligned with the Maine Learning Results, and activities for him or her to achieve these learning goals.
Schools today have several barriers to obtaining these goals. Many schools are asked to do too much and in a specific way, and on too small of a budget. The Maine Learning Results state that every Maine student should benefit from secondary schooling by becoming "a clear and effective communicator, a self-directed and life-long learner, a creative and practical problem solver, a responsible and involved citizen, a collaborative and quality worker, and an integrative and informed thinker". We must overcome these barriers to ensure that students are recieving the resources and educational tools necessary to achieve these qualities to secure productive and quality futures for our youth. The report offers 'core practices' to help achieve this. One is that all students should be respected and valued by adults and fellow students. This is an idea we explored in 'Discipline with Dignity', and holds true as students need to feel safe, respected, and valued to be motivated to reach their full potential.
Synthesis - Group 5
Throughout our responses to Promising Futures, we all talked about the different aspects of the plan that we really liked, as well as focusing on some of the challenges. In several of the responses, students mentioned how happy they were that tracking becomes eliminated in this plan. Rather than separating students in Maine high schools into the haves and have-nots (in terms of going to college) we would be able to teach these students tracked into different programs together while meeting all of their needs. This is something that several students related back to the idea of Mass Customized Learning, where each student gets to work at their own pace with a plethora of student choice. The combination of students working at their own pace and students having a ton of choice in their education would then help motivate students to continue learning and be successful.Another idea that was mentioned by several students was the idea of phasing out the standard school year schedule, with school lasting six hours per day, five days per week, from September to June. If we are meeting students where they are at (as is suggested by Promising Futures) and letting them work at their own pace, how is it possible to keep the same regimented school structure for everyone? For some students, it might be better to allow them to come to school fewer hours per day but for more weeks, or to have students stay longer each day and come fewer days per week. Although there may not be a way to make this work effectively, the idea of letting students customize their school experience down to the hours, weeks, and months is incredibly interesting. Although we agreed on a lot, there were differing opinions about how much standardization should be put in place for the ideas presented in Promising Futures, revealing that while we all seemed to appreciate their ideas, that we would need to be a part of the implementation process to fully understand what these ideas look like in schools.
Rachel Joiner
I found this article to be interesting, as well as inspiring. Many of the things discussed in this article, are examples of things I wish to implement in my classroom, or various things we have discussed in class. I loved the idea of having teams as well as advisory “family groups” where teachers and students stayed together for four years, and had a great relationship. I think that this seems the best way to spread work out for teachers, as well as provide students with advisers and mentors who care and can help them throughout their high school career. I also thought the cross-disciplinary work with an essential theme was an excellent concept. I think that by doing this students can make real world connections, and gain a better understanding of a topic. This concept was something I would like to see implemented in my future school and class.
I connected the idea that ran throughout this article of giving students a voice in their curriculum and letting them decide to our group’s educational issue of mass customized learning. I thought this was similar in the sense that students had choices and worked at their own pace. I think this is vital to allowing students to succeed and truly understand the content. I loved the idea of each student creating his or her own individualized learning plan, along with one for the future. I thought that sharing with their parents was a great idea too. I think this should be done in every school, because it offers personal help and goals to every single student, and helps them focus on their future with the guide and support of their teachers and parents. I think by implementing this more students will go on to graduate, seek higher education, and simply enjoy school overall more.
Daniel Kiley
Whenever I see standards of any kind involving education, I always see them as common sense. It is easier said than done, which is why we have these standards, so I understand.I have never been a part of a school devoted to Promising Futures, but some of the ideas sound really interesting. Having teams to help students forward can be beneficial to a school. Having extra support not only by teachers but also students creates a strong community, which I feel some schools lack. It's also nice to have professional conferences so teachers can be assessed on their standings. Cross-disciplinary work is also something I would be interested in partaking in. Usually you would see Social Studies with English, but I think it would be interesting to see other disciplines merge together, such as Math and English or Science and English. This reminds me of MCL, and Promised Futures is like the precursor to it. Having students individualize their own learning to make it authentic and something they are interested in is more important than any standard test. We want studies to learn, and in order to learn they must enjoy what they are doing. And when we bring parents into the equation, the community grows even larger, and the success the student is inevitable.Lauren Breton
I really liked that Promising Futures emphasized that there are really two paths in every Maine high school: one for students who intend to go to college and one for everyone else. Although I had never thought of it that way, every traditional high school in Maine that I have heard about seems to separate students in this way. I also liked that in this text they did not put the blame on teachers for the failing school systems, but rather put the blame on how much we as a culture have asked our high schools to do with limited resources. I was also really happy to find out that Maine was ranked number one in the nation for allocating the money for education and actually placing that money into classrooms for teachers to use.For me, the most interesting part of Promising Futures was the “Practices to Consider Phasing Out” section. Most of the practices that they discussed phasing out are practices that I experienced as a student and that I just accepted as a normal part of school. I particularly like the idea of phasing out the six hour, five day, September to June school schedule. While I think that taking a break from teaching and learning can be valuable for both students and teachers, I think that it would also be possible to involve students in learning for extended periods of times throughout the school year. I also liked the idea of getting staff involved in planning staff development days, as well as changing the culture so that we don’t consider those “days off”, but we consider them as a legitimate part of our jobs as teachers and integral to forming classroom environments that are safe and caring, focus on high learning goals for each student, and equitable practices throughout the entire school and curriculum.
Meng Hardy
There were so much inspirational ideas and approaches in Promising Future. Some of them are already in practice, such as a school being divided into communities and teachers having a set group of students. Those approaches may be more typical for middle schools, but I feel the importance for this system setup for younger high school students, when they are still in transition to be more independent on their academic and social lives. Before students know if they are on the college-track or career-track, they need a sense of belonging in the high school and community while approaching their self-realization.Phasing out the “five days, six hours, and September to June” makes a lot of sense to me. It aligns with my belief of diverse learning styles, MIs, etc. We could benefit constructive professional development scheduled in the school year while students are engaged in meaningful activities that are lead by staff members.
There was another focus on individualized plan on learning. It fit with the belief and ideas of Mass Customized Learning. First two years of high school is a period of time when students need guidance but also thrive to make their own choices. Individualized plan gives students “voice and choice” in terms of their learning, which will make them more engaged in school, because they are learning what they are interested in. Individualized plan aligns with what most high schools do, however, in this article, I sense that it emphasize on the team teachers’ guidance and support that they could give to students. For the first two years of high school, students can truly benefit from those support until they are more independent on decision making.
Megan Millette
This article seemed very interesting and had many strong key points being made. From the statistics at the beginning to the challenge and its focus, this article has helped me discover a diverse range of information on Maine schools. The challenge presented in Promising Futures is an area of education I wish could have been implemented into my school in the past. This system acts as a great equalizer in making sure students, parents, faculty, educators, and administrators get an opinion and job in the learning experience. The core principles and practices help create this idea of a learning community that caters to all. I really enjoyed this aspect of it because it mainly shows that all these people play a role in education that is equally important, even if some of these members are aware of their roles. This shows how schools can come together to promise students the best education they deserve while also staying true to their interests and goals.Many of the aspects discussed in this article were areas in which I wished to look at further. There were many that I had already desired for my classroom and learning atmosphere. This article emphasized the fact that most of the areas I wished to pursue in my classroom were possible. I really enjoyed the main principles that dealt with making the classroom a safe environment for all and dealt mainly with understanding students as a whole but also individually. I also really enjoyed the focus on students and the multiple ways to educate students that will help them better understand. This article encourages us to focus on students needs but to also work collaboratively with many different people within the school environment. I really liked how the 15 practices help to show this collaboration and allow all to see their importance in the learning experience. This article was really educational and I found myself desiring to see it being used in a classroom.
Kevin Lind
After reading Promising Futures, I thoroughly think that some standardization is necessary in schools. As much as I hate to say it, there doesn’t seem to be any better way of making sure teachers are meeting the needs of their students. I wish there could be a more effective means of making sure teachers are following the principles described in this piece. It could be cool if schools adopted a similar model to summer camps; having visits from administrative officials to make sure certain practices are being implemented.
Principle 10 stands out to me as the principle that is the most powerful. It essentially suggests that students should be able to base their learning around a schedule that is most effective for them. I especially like the idea of bringing together a team of teachers to evaluate what would work best of their students. This idea reminds me of when I had an IEP that allowed me to go to school for half days due to increased fatigue. How great would it be if we could take the time to make an IEP for every student?!
I’m also really into the idea of integrating learning into discussions about life outside of school. As a future social studies teacher, I spend a lot of time looking at events happening around the world. For me, having students looking at implementing what I teach them to better the world is my idea of success. I know when I was in high school, my government teacher continually pushed us to write to our elected officials about issues that affected us.
Kaitlyn Bukauskas
'Promising Futures' is a report calling a need for change in Maine's secondary and technical schools. The report aims to motivate school faculty, parents, community members, and students in playing active roles to improve the learning experience of students so that every Maine youth receives a secondary education that provides the necessary skills, knowledge, and attitudes to secure for them a promising and productive future. The report breaks goals down into 6 'Core Principles' to help achieve this goal:
A safe, respectful and caring environment
High universal expectations with a variety of learning opportunities
Understanding and actions based on assessmenst data
Teacher practice which values and builds upon the contributions and needs of each learner
Equitable and democratic practices
Coherence among mission, goals, actions, and outcomes.
'Promising Futures' states that student achievement in the state of Maine varies greatly from school to school dependent upon community resources, and even within the schools with students attending what feels like two high schools within one- one with students in a college track, and one with students in another track. The report states that tracking is an ineffective way to group students and says that often times the "lower" tracks have too many students, many of which are not being challenged and are capable of more than they are doing but don't bother to try because they are not offered the challenge or motivated by teachers, parents, or the community. We need to eliminate this idea of forcing students into tracked education plans and instead put the responsiblity onto the student and empower him or her to create an educational plan with goals aligned with the Maine Learning Results, and activities for him or her to achieve these learning goals.
Schools today have several barriers to obtaining these goals. Many schools are asked to do too much and in a specific way, and on too small of a budget. The Maine Learning Results state that every Maine student should benefit from secondary schooling by becoming "a clear and effective communicator, a self-directed and life-long learner, a creative and practical problem solver, a responsible and involved citizen, a collaborative and quality worker, and an integrative and informed thinker". We must overcome these barriers to ensure that students are recieving the resources and educational tools necessary to achieve these qualities to secure productive and quality futures for our youth. The report offers 'core practices' to help achieve this. One is that all students should be respected and valued by adults and fellow students. This is an idea we explored in 'Discipline with Dignity', and holds true as students need to feel safe, respected, and valued to be motivated to reach their full potential.